Two reports published Friday indicate Democratic activists in Nashville are considering an attempt to recall Metro Nashville Council Member David Benton due to his recent appearance with U.S. Representative Andy Ogles (R-TN-05), as well as a collection of state lawmakers and federal immigration officials, at a press conference announcing the congressional probe into Mayor Freddie O’Connell for his actions in response to federal immigration enforcement.
Both The Nashville Banner and The Tennessee Lookout published reports on Friday claiming a possible recall effort could be underway targeting Benton, with The Lookout specifically reporting that “Nashville Democrats” are behind the effort.
That report was bolstered by similar claims in The Banner, which cited at least two sources indicating a possible recall was being contemplated, before noting, “any recall effort is likely to turn into a sideshow that continues to put a target on the city by state and federal actors.”
While Benton tied his appearance at Ogles’ press conference to the reluctance by O’Connell to implement the license plate readers (LPRs) approved by Nashville in 2023, the potential effort to recall the councilman was reported just one day after Council Member Erin Evans told The Banner that some were trying to “bastardize the conversation” with “hyper-partisan antics.”
“That’s not helpful to any aspect of the conversation,” Evans told the outlet, which reported that Benton’s appearance at the press conference created “an additional wedge” because of the Republicans and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials in attendance.
Reports claiming that Benton may face a recall effort also emerged after the Metro Council Immigrant Caucus issued a press release condemning his appearance.
Posted on Thursday to Instagram, the Nashville Immigrant Caucus accused Benton of engaging in “dangerous, racially-charged language” to “prop up a useless, xenophobic congressman.”
The local elected officials wrote, “We remind him, and the public, that the only true ‘invasion’ of this land occurred in 1492 with the arrival of European colonizers,” and said that the failure by those at the press conference to acknowledge this “is both historically ignorant and morally reprehensible.”
Ultimately, they called for Benton to resign, claiming he is “no longer fit to represent our community.”
As noted by The Banner, any effort to recall Benton could be clouded by the congressional probe into O’Connell, as Ogles on Friday published a letter requesting documents and internal communications related to the mayor’s executive order mandating Metro employees report interactions with federal immigration officials to him and Nashville’s Office of New Americans, as well as the “Belonging Fund” that raises money for immigrants impacted by deportations, and was seeded by nonprofits that Metro Nashville awarded federal dollars.
A recall effort could also be obscured by additional immigration enforcement by the federal government, as White House Border Czar Tom Homan recently pledged to devote extra attention to Nashville in the wake of O’Connell’s actions.
“We’re going to pay a lot of attention to [O’Connell] because… if you’re going to support criminal aliens walking the street, then we know there’s a problem there,” said Homan on Wednesday. “When we have places like Nashville pushing back against us getting the bad guys, that’s where we have to concentrate resources to make those streets safer.”
Benton told The Tennessee Star on Tuesday that he was concerned O’Connell’s actions through the “Belonging Fund,” in addition to those mandated under the executive order, could constitute violations of federal laws.
“It’s as if he read U.S. Code 1324 and picked as many things in the law as he could to intentionally violate it,” said Benton on Tuesday.
Benton also said that the transfer of money from the federal government to Metro Nashville, then to various nonprofits, who then sometimes transferred it to other nonprofits, “has a money laundering ring to it.”
Suggesting this could be a violation of the Racketeering and Influenced Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, Benton told The Star, “we might be entering into a RICO violation conspiring to use Federal funds to evade federal immigration or working together to fraudulently use federal funds to support unlawful immigration, a combination of RICO and 1324.”
The council member questioned, “why do we even need to give the appearance of this?”
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Tom Pappert is the lead reporter for The Tennessee Star, and also reports for The Pennsylvania Daily Star and The Arizona Sun Times. Follow Tom on X/Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “David Benton” by Andy Ogles.
nashville council and mayors office are infested with communists
Metro Council members were hamstrung when voters put FAKE TERM LIMITS on their ability to fight the Socialist Powers taking hold in Nashville. Voting is term limits. Now voters have no power to keep in office those persons who are willing to “fight the Socialists.”
The sad scenario is those who now “run” for Council are hand selected by the Socialists in power in the Metro Courthouse ( including Judges & other elected officials).
The People who pay the taxes in Metro have no real voice. If you happen to go against the machine, they will go after you like a pack of hyenas. Therefore, decent ethical people are less likely to run.
We no longer have a Democrat form of government in Nashville. It’s like a Color Revolution.
It’s a mockery of Democracy.
HAIL TO O’CONNELL!
It takes very brave individuals to fight Tyranny, esp when most people who vote are clueless.
Now they are the puppet masters & still working as Marxists.
Apparently the local Nashville democrats are as clueless as their national counterparts. If they had any common sense, they would be working with the republicans to make America a better place for LEGAL AMERICANS. But then again, if they actually had any common sense they wouldn’t be democrats.
Maybe we should embrace recalls. Nashville taxpayers are about to get clobbered to fund this idiocy.
See if your council member is on the committee. It is time for Nashvillians to vote and take out the trash.
All Democrat carpetbaggers are one of two. Social Democrat or Democratic National Socialist.
What one allows, one gets more of. It is a ‘tricky’ legislative problem because of the ‘Home Rule’ provisions of the Tennessee Constitution which give certain strong constitutional protections to local governments and the exercise of their governmental powers in Tennessee. The Tennessee General Assembly will need to ‘thread the needle’ ever so deftly in the way that it goes about any such reform legislation (e.g., or maybe even constitutional amendment). This problem likely will require a carefully coordinated Administration or Leadership Plan concerning any proposed legislative initiative, but if the Tennessee General Assembly does not ‘rein in’ and ‘bust up’ this radical leftist Marxist (i.e., pro-communist) democrat ‘snake nest’ in our State’s capital, in a very short time Metro Nashville—Davidson County will severely, and permanently, damage Tennessee’s future economic prospects, and also its political and social life (i.e., just like very leftist cities in other States have done)—think Atlanta in Georgia, think the Northern Virginia D. C. suburbs/cities in Virginia, think Austin and Houston in Texas, think New Orleans in Louisiana, etc. etc. etc. Seems that every year Metro Nashville just gets worse and worse and worse. The time to act is now before the ‘roots of this weed’ grow any deeper or get any stronger, not later.
“The local elected officials wrote, “We remind him, and the public, that the only true ‘invasion’ of this land occurred in 1492 with the arrival of European colonizers,” and said that the failure by those at the press conference to acknowledge this “is both historically ignorant and morally reprehensible.””
LOL! Tell me you are stupid without telling me you are stupid. They don’t even realize the ignorant things they say while calling others ignorant. Pathetic!
here we go again. disagree with us and we will cancel you out
Can’t have a law-abiding elected official like Benton on our Communist Metro Council.
I support Benton .